Wednesday, February 15. 2012

MOSCOW  A Russian Proton-M rocket carrying a Dutch telecommunication satellite blasted off from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan late Tuesday, according to Russia's Federal Space Agency Roscosmos.

Roscosmos' live webcast showed that the Proton-M rocket was launched at 23:36 Moscow time (1936 GMT). According to the agency, the separation of the Dutch satellite SES-4 (NSS-14) from the rocket was scheduled for 08:48 Moscow time (0448 GMT) on Wednesday.

The launch of the Proton-M with the Dutch satellite was initially slated for Dec. 26 last year, but was postponed twice due to technical reasons.

The Dutch satellite NSS-14 (SES-4) was designed to provide various satellite services to customers in the Middle East, Europe, Africa and Latin America. (PNA/Xinhua)